Lodz; Bank Note

Further Information

This currency had no monetary value and could not be used outside of the ghetto. Unlike other ghettos, Lodz also had its own coins as well as bank notes. The notes carry the name Litzmannstadt, as Lodz had been renamed ‘Litzmannstadt’ by the Nazis in April 1940 after German general Karl Litzmann, who had captured the city during the First World War. They have a menorah on one side and carry the signature of Mordechai Chaim Rumkowski in his role as chairman of the Jewish Council of the ghetto. The notes came in denominations of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20 and 50 marks and 50 pfenning. The currency was issued both by the Issuing Bank and later the Bank for Purchase of Valuable Objects and Clothing, which opened on August 12th 1940. This bank exchanged foreign currency and valuables for ghetto currency. The property and currency given in was then handed over to Nazi officials. The creation of ghetto currency allowed the Nazis to rob Jewish people of their money and possessions, which were never to be returned once exchanged for ghetto currency.      

Sources:

Centre for Holocaust and Genocide Studies ‘Numismatics’, University of Minnesota; Driven to Discover [Online]. Available at: http://www.chgs.umn.edu/histories/philatelic/naziNumismatics3.html (Accessed: 24 January 2015).

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Shoah Resource Centre ‘Notes by a Jewish Observer in the Lodz Ghetto Following the Deportation of the Children’, Yad Vashem [Online]. Available at: http://www.yadvashem.org/odot_pdf/Microsoft%20Word%20-%206030.pdf (Accessed 21 January 2015).

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United States Holocaust Memorial Museum ‘Lodz’ (20 June 2014) Holocaust Encyclopedia, USHMM [Online]. Available at: http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005071 (Accessed 24 January 2015).

Yad Vashem ‘Heartstrings; Music of the Holocaust; Lodz Ghetto’, Yad Vashem [Online]. Available at: http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/music/lodz.asp (Accessed 24 January 2015).

Yad Vashem ‘The Holocaust; The Ghettos; Lodz Ghetto’, Yad Vashem [Online]. Available at: http://www.yadvashem.org/yv/en/holocaust/about/03/lodz.asp (Accessed 24 January 2015).

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